Some Mother's Day Thoughts

When I'm not teaching law, I moonlight as an advice columnist for the Fort Fairfield Journal in Maine. I got this gig because I liked the paper, which Szonyi's friend Steve Shaw sent to us. I asked the editor if I could sign on as a columnist, and in that he wrote most of the rest of the paper himself, he was game. This alternative paper (which, among other things recommends that its readers not sign up for social security numbers as they are the sign of the beast, see Revelations) will ensure that I will never have a position of public trust. Meanwhile, for my first column, I had to actually make up my own letter. Here's the second column:

OK, Fort Fairfield, so far no letters from readers asking for advice or disagreeing with my first column. My email is aorenste@indiana.edu. If you don’t have access to the internet, send the letter to the editor, David Deschesne, and he will get it to me. Meanwhile, in between compulsively checking my email to see if there’s a letter from a Fort Fairfield reader, I am moved to think about Mother’s Day.

I remember as a kid once asking my mother, no doubt on Mother’s Day, why there was no children’s day. “Every day is children’s day,” she explained with some measure of not-so-subtle criticism of the cushy lives led by my brother, sister, and me. This seemed unfair at the time and still does today. Certainly if children are spoiled, they are not directly to blame. Someone has indulged them inappropriately and then has the bad grace to call them names (or, as in my case, insinuate that they have it way too good).

I am aware, however, of how remarkably lucky I was (and am). Although my family was never wealthy, my father’s salary as a rabbi assured that we never worried about where the next meal was coming from. Being a preacher’s kid did mean some unwanted attention drawn to our family, and some very unwelcome encouragement to be a good role model for other kids – I was already enough of a goody-goody to discourage the popularity I craved. Mostly, though, I felt safe and loved. The only real trauma of my youth was a serious illness of my mother’s. She was in bed for eight months and at points there was doubt as to her recovery. My grandmother stepped in to take care of us kids and I realized that my mother was right – we had it very good. My grandmother was a lot less indulgent.

What one enjoys growing up is not necessarily what one looks back upon with appreciation later on. As a kid, I remember loving to roller skate, to visit the mall (a new concept in architecture), and to go out for fillet of fish. I now, however, appreciate my mother’s work ethic, something that as a kid I took for granted or even perhaps thought of as a negative.

My mother has always been a fierce worker, with high expectations for herself and others. When she was a stay-at-home-Mom, she participated in many charitable organizations and school activities. She always toted a serious book on history, even to the beauty parlor. When, at age 48, she went to law school and launched a second career, she was equally diligent, nerdy even, working first in corporate law and later in criminal defense. One of her proudest moments was getting an innocent man (who had already spent eight years in jail) exonerated and freed.

A willingness to work hard, and a concept of what hard work looked like, turned out to be a great gift. None of us siblings can equal her energy and grit, but she showed us the importance of persistence and how to remain undaunted. Parents teach these values in a million subtle ways. If I could bottle the formula and sell it to lazy, busy, or self-indulgent parents, I’d be a rich woman. But, it turns out, teaching hard work is itself hard work.

This past year has been a tough one for my Mom who has been undergoing treatment for breast cancer. Surgery and the chemotherapy are not for sissies. My Mom almost never complains. Most of her concerns are directed towards her family. Mostly, she doesn’t want us to worry. She also feels bad that my father’s first year of retirement was dominated by her illness, though she acknowledges that he has had plenty of time to play tennis and repeatedly re-injure his knee.

My Mom is an exceptional woman. But then again, most mothers are exceptional, and all have something to teach us (though for some Moms, their teaching is of the inadvertent or “don’t do this” variety).

What should we aim to teach our kids? What are the core aspirations we mothers have for them? I think about this a lot and have determined that my main goals for my three boys are that they be compassionate, involved in their community, kind to those around them, and willing to do their fair share. I don’t care much about their material success, but they should be self-supporting. A healthy, able kid in his thirties who is mooching off his parents is just sad.

This Mother’s Day, I’d like my kids to cook me dinner and make a charitable donation in my honor. A food pantry would be nice. Or they might consider Heiffer.com where you can purchase a goat for a family in Africa that will allow them (between the wool and the milk) to be self supporting. It would be the best Mother’s Day present, better than flowers, or jewelry, or a fancy restaurant meal. By cooking a decent dinner and recognizing their obligations to others, they will demonstrate that I’ve managed to pass on some of the very fine traditions of service and self-sufficiency personified by their grandmother. Nothing would make my Mother’s Day happier.